In the presence of agglomeration economies, the effects of a rural roads programme depend not only on the reduction in transportation costs, but also on the form of labour mobility. When financed by a poll tax on rural households, the wage will rise, accompanied by some return migration,...

Do urban agglomeration economies enhance the social profitability of rural roads? When all goods are traded at parametric world prices, lower transport costs benefit villagers. Urban activities and welfare are unaffected if labour is immobile, but their levels fall when rural workers move freely...

The structure employed is a small open economy, with one city and a rural hinterland, two traded goods, a transport sector, two specific factors, and mobile labour. A socially profitable programme will promote not only internal, but also external trade. Theory and numerical examples indicate...

Do 'local' methods of evaluation, such as partial equilibrium analysis at market prices or estimation of shadow prices, provide reliable assessments of a large rural roads programme's social profitability? Consider a small open economy with one city and a rural hinterland, two traded goods, two...

This paper investigates the effects of India’s rural roads program (PMGSY) on morbidity, using data on 279 households drawn from 30 villages in a region of upland Orissa. The households were surveyed in 2010 and 2013, yielding an unbalanced panel of 1580 individuals, 1076 of whom were present...

India's rural roads program, Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana, aims to draw villagers into the mainstream by improving not only their terms of trade, but also their educational attainments and health. Treating each all-weather feeder road as an isolated element within the larger network, and...